On a side note, I'm studying computer science, so the vast majority of my classmates are all into hardware and tweaking to some degree. When I told them about purchasing a sound card, amplifier and headphone for 600 euro's in total I got some really funny non-understanding responses, which was really funny.

He: "Why would you spend SO MUCH on SOUND?"

Me: "Well dude, you spend (not unlike me, i have to confess) €600 on a image with your gpu and lcd screen alone, which I spend on sound, the difference is, what sounds great now will still sound great in 10 years and those graphics that look great now will be deprecated in 2 years time!"

"Why build a super expensive gaming machine, spend so much on your game graphics and doom yourself with €20 speakers/'phones and onboard sound!?"

$5000 seems a bit exaggerated though, I'd be having trouble by merely composing hardware for a system and reaching that amount!

Though, as I said, I have to confess, I'm a gamer too and I've got a processor and graphics card which cost $300 and $500 and probably would only last about a year or three. But indeed I still find it strange that spending that same amount of money on sound is so much more frowned upon than spending such money on image

The only situation (next to upgrade-itis) in which I would ever have to upgrade my hardware is when my card isn't supported anymore in terms of either software or hardware, though that will probably be quite a bit more than 2 years :D

And nice expensive phones and amps will last for as long as they're not broken :)

$5000 seems a bit exaggerated though, I'd be having trouble by merely composing hardware for a system and reaching that amount!

Though, as I said, I have to confess, I'm a gamer too and I've got a processor and graphics card which cost $300 and $500 and probably would only last about a year or three. But indeed I still find it strange that spending that same amount of money on sound is so much more frowned upon than spending such money on image

The only situation (next to upgrade-itis) in which I would ever have to upgrade my hardware is when my card isn't supported anymore in terms of either software or hardware, though that will probably be quite a bit more than 2 years :D

And nice expensive phones and amps will last for as long as they're not broken :)

dont worry, here in headfi, we welcome you with open arms and feel sorry for your wallet.

Comparing the HE-400 to the K702, the HE-400 is more ragged with higher peaks and dips and a fairly similar curve. The D2K have a bit less treble, but still rather close save a bump in the midrange. The DT880 have less of a bump at 2K, but a larger peak at 10K. The 598 removes the 2K bump while retaining a similar FR again.

I don't see how you can find the Q701 "bright" compared to these honestly - it's a pretty flat phone overall.

Just received the M-Stage, had to pay €25 customs duties, delivery guy told me they picked at random, well, seems I'm lucky, I ordered something from outside my country 4 times, got customs duties every single time.

Back to the amp:

I'm quite impressed how strong this thing is built, this thing seriously feels like you can kill an elephant with it :D

Been listening to it for about half an hour now and it's already making quite a difference with my HD555's, my main conceptions are that I can basically "feel" everything, every guitar strum, every vintage synthesizer note, every piano note, everything feels more vibrating, this thing is really doing wonders to underlying low frequencies. It all packs a punch and "feels more full". Cymbals also sound a lot crispier and clearer.

Also played 30 minutes of TF2 with CMSS3D headphone doing its magic with OpenAL, and I can tell for sure that an amp really improves the 3D effect. Not sure why it would make the positioning better but I can really tell a difference.

So far, I can't wait to have this thing working at its full potential when my Q's roll in :D

EDIT: Connected it to my crappy $70 2.1 speakers as a pre-amp and wow....exact same type of improvements, especially the bass seems to extend a lot lower

I don't see why your source would matter for burn-in, as long as you're getting the rounded vibrations of pink/white noise into the speakers. You might as well put the mileage on the cheap source instead of expensive one.

Try out the left/right channel balance on these on a "wide" sounding recording. That was one of the most impressive things to me. Moving the balance to the left or right with my DT 880s just made it sound like I had turned one speaker up and one speaker down. On the K 702s it sounds like the sound literally floated a few feet away from your head in that direction.

The bass is definitely about speed and not so much about quantity, but hey, a change from Sennheiser for sure right? Personally after getting used to it most "bassy" headphones just sound fake and cheap to me now. I like to hear the actual contact between a drumstick and drum instead of a big digital thud.

Hmm no need for the bass knob anymore, I'm starting to like this signature quite a bit!

Though I feel the soundstage seems like a little too much, I mean, it's utterly terrific for soundwh##ing games like call of duty, but with music I catch myself turning the volume up too high because everything sounds so distant.